They may, for instance, understand that voting for Ossoff is not only a vote against Trump but a vote for progressive liberals like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, who was given a near 60 percent disapproval rating in the 6th District. My guess is that most experts would have considered Handel a moderate favorite to defend the seat successfully in 2018.
Advertisement
The Democrats haven’t won a majority in the House since four election cycles ago.
What’s more, if Republican party leadership accomplishes its aim and millions of Americans do lose their insurance so the richest of the rich can get a tax cut, these candidates won’t be eking out wins in the sunbelt exurbs of Georgia’s sixth – or anywhere else. It was exclusively because of the disaster that is the Trump presidency, which, historically, should mean energized Democrats and dispirited Republicans. Trump’s fate won’t be decided in special elections for Congress, but in the 2020 presidential election. “So, we are paving a way for a new generation of leadership”. It didn’t work, as Democrats nationally continued to vilify Trump and congressional Republicans. When Democrats took control of the House in 2007, Pelosi became the first – and so far only – woman Speaker of the House.
If the average Republican is willing to look past Trump’s sins (and, obviously, many GOPers like him outright), they can start weighing many other factors.
“If we think we’re going to win these elections because President Trump’s at 35 percent, I think in districts like mine and certainly Georgia and SC, it takes more than that”, said Rep. Tim Walz of Minnesota.
He says Dems need to get out and listen to the needs of the voter to win back seats.
“The way the districts are drawn make that even more hard”, he said.
They are so unhappy that Republicans are 5 – 0 in special elections since President Trump took office.
Rice’s sentiment was echoed by other House Democrats in recent months including Reps.
In this March 28, 2017 photo, House Ways and Means Committee member Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr., D-N.J. speaks during a meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington. “Fantastic job, we are all very proud of you!” tweeted Mr. Trump, who had publicly implored Republicans to troop to the polls to back the candidate. Ryan, who challenged Pelosi last fall, said he has no interest in doing so again.
Senate Republicans are set to unveil the top-lines of their bill to repeal and replace Obamacare Thursday, in hopes of setting up a vote next week.
At least one Democratic lawmaker called Ossoff’s loss a “wake-up call for Democrats”.
President Donald Trump says he always told a “straight story” about whether he recorded his private conversations with his fired Federal Bureau of Investigation director James Comey. She has beat back all comers, including last fall, when Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan of OH ran against her. Ryan fell well short but garnered dozens of votes, enough to underscore dissatisfaction with Pelosi and with her aging leadership team that has left promising young Democrats with few places to rise. Of the 7,218 Californians who gave money to influence this Georgia race, 3,063 were people from the San Francisco Bay area – otherwise known as Pelosi-land.
Advertisement
While the Center for Responsive Politics documented that over .7 million had been spent in the short campaign, viewed by many as a referendum on the Trump administration, gun politics also played a part in the contest. As a successful businesswoman, Handel was Georgia secretary of state from 2007-2009, chair of a county board of commissioners and ran unsuccessfully for governor and the state senate. The critical change element may be the absence of an incumbent and not the presence of Donald Trump. If perennial swing Justice Anthony Kennedy agrees, the reverberations would likely extend to MI and a more than dozen other states where Republicans control the map-making process.
